The Utah Shakespearean Festival (USF), now underway in Cedar City, UT, continues apace with a busy summer schedule. Having opened June 26, the festival is presenting several plays in repertory this summer and fall.

Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (directed by USF newcomer Ina Marlowe), The Merry Wives of Windsor (directed by Elizabeth Huddle) and The War of the Ross (helmed by actor-director Howard Jensen) will be staged through Sept. 2 in the Adams Theatre.

Sir James M. Barrie's Peter Pan (adapted and directed by USF's Fred C. Adams), Michael Frayn's Noises Off (directed by festival veteran D. Scott Glasser) and Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard (directed by Kathleen F. Conlin) will run concurrently in the Randall L. Jones Theatre.

The Utah Shakespearean 2000 season wraps this fall with two additional shows in the Randall L. Jones Theatre, the Ted Swindley musical Always...Patsy Cline (directed by Jonathan Gillard Daly) and Alfred Uhry's Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, Driving Miss Daisy (directed by J.R. Sullivan). These two fall season plays will run in repertory from Sept. 14 to Oct. 14. Driving Miss Daisy previews Sept. 14 and Always...Patsy Cline previews Sept. 15. Both shows open Sept. 16 and run Wed. - Sat. on a daily matinee/evening schedule through Oct. 14.

Special performances of Peter Pan are scheduled for Aug. 21 and 28 at 8:30 PM. In production notes, USF founder and executive producer Fred C. Adams points out that with the 2000 production of Henry VI, Parts 1, 2 and 3, the festival will have produced all 37 of the Bard's works at one time or another.

Tickets for both seasons, summer and fall are available at (800) 752 9849. The USF box office is located at 351 W. Center Street, Cedar City, Utah. For more information visit www.bard.org.

-- By Murdoch McBride